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It was only to spar, he said, and finally, after three moons, she agreed.
A duel between them deserved a finer setting than the training grounds with more light than a single torch, but these were trivial things. He had waited five miserable years to challenge Byleth again and though trading blows in the dark was almost a mockery of what he had envisioned for them, he could hardly contain the animal kicking in his chest.
Her blade flashed in the heavy darkness, a silvery apparition reaching out only to touch his before scraping away as quick as they met. The way she fought had driven him to something akin to obsession; she met most enemies with passivity, but when she fought him, she put those well-guarded Blade Breaker techniques on full display. To be one of the few to see them must have been what followers of Seiros felt when given their beloved archbishop’s blessing. But what thrilled him most was how well they moved together. There had always been an awkwardness between her and the Death Knight because of his mount and the heft of his scythe, but Jeritza seemed to fit her in every way — his reach, her agility, her patience, his impulse — perfect compliments to the other.
Byleth’s sword clattered when it met the stone floor, sending a sharp, ringing echo up into the eaves of the open roof. Allowing him to fight beside her had given him new insight into her fighting style, including her weak points — one being her dainty wrists, which she had foolishly left unprotected. Already disarmed himself, Jeritza dug the tips of his fingers into the pressure points there, forcing her hand limp, then wrenched her arm behind her back. One clever turn of his elbow trapped both her wrists in his grasp; her body arched away from him, curved like the limbs of a bow. The average opponent would cry out in agony bent and locked the way he had her, but she would not gratify him for so little effort. She would bear it, daring him to do worse.
So alike; so hungry for pain.
Jeritza bared his canines in a grin.
He snatched her dagger from its scabbard and lifted her chin with the flat of the blade. He hadn't won — to think so would be naïve — but she was at his mercy for the moment. Mercy, however, did not keep him from losing his wits and slitting her throat. Anticipation coursed through him as he awaited her brilliant recovery, kept his hand steady. A blink of steel, turning on him, plunging into him — that alone kept the Death Knight at bay.
She swore under her breath, twisted and squirmed in his hold. The movement drew his gaze downward. Though her form was more important than her figure, an unobscured view of her body was rare and admittedly fascinating. But it was not gratuitous, leather-bound curves which hurled him beyond the threshold of decency. In her efforts to struggle away, the tip of the dagger caught her throat, leaving a razor-thin scratch just over her pulse. It seemed she hadn’t noticed it at all, being so fine a cut, but he was utterly mesmerized by it, his animal senses sharpening in time with the slow bleed. Vivid red swelled into glossy drops, diffused into her sweat, painted her skin with a caress of pink, and he lost himself to desire. Whichever part of him was responsible made no difference; he wanted only to sink his teeth into the wound, open her up and coat his tongue with her hot, lustrous blood.
A firm jerk brought their bodies together.
Nothing happened — no pure electric contact of their bodies, no sweet tang of iron on his tongue, nothing he had dared to hope for — she only stilled.
They weren't yet fighting to the death, but he wished she had killed him that night because after what he did, he was certain he would never know such bliss.
Watching her stiff, retreating form stirred a dull rage within him. He was sick, unable to control his snap perverse urges; now he had driven her away.
Jeritza tightened his grip on the offending dagger, then flung it aside.
That was the end of it.
For years he suffered the Death Knight's demands for her, his obsessive thirst for her blood, his insistence that they would starve without her. And so he starved.
In his efforts to avoid upsetting her further, he kept his distance, graced with nothing more than strands of her hair and the hem of her cloak. Had he known dueling her would end so disastrously, he would have waited until the war’s end to embarrass himself. Then, at the very least, he could disappear instead of forcing himself to endure the joyless hell of a one-sided rivalry. If he had a choice — and after a half-decade of obsessing, he felt sure he didn’t — he never would have continued living trapped in her thrall after she had so handily rejected him.
War councils had only been endurable with Byleth leading them; she took command of few conversations, but when she did, they flowed almost like poetry. She made sure everyone had a chance to speak, and even knew how to read the faces of those like him who preferred not to; there was never a missed perspective in the room, in fact. He even thought he might have enjoyed being her student before the war, rather than a loose pawn in a failed infiltration plot. But after his enormous misstep with her, Byleth’s authority faltered at the war table and the squawking and bickering he was used to resurged. He stopped attending altogether.
The battlefield was worse. Fighting beside Byleth had been his only solace since their first night as allies, and to no longer have that shred of pleasure in violence to share with her was another great twist to the knife in his gut. Damn him, he still indulged in those memories whenever he touched himself — how they carved through the Knights of Seiros together, tearing into their defenses with such honest barbarity he could delude himself into thinking she was enough like him to understand, maybe even accept him despite the detestable things he had done. While that line of thought strayed nearer to romance than he liked, accepting him meant accepting his blade. Or his life, if their final struggle ended in such a way. But his orders changed after his little transgression, cast him far afield of her, for miles until he lost sight of her, and even those former students who still stayed close to their teacher. He could no longer stay as her shadow, nor keep her life for himself.
Sometimes he imagined finding her among the dead, torso unzipped by an axe or weighted lance, wearing a lowly brigand’s sloppy work. But she would wear it beautifully — soft, pink hues, the most striking crimson, and a brilliant yet delicate green — and the gleam of it all! It disgusted him to admit it, but he would admire her resplendent corpse, wringing from it what pleasure he could.
Gut-wrenching as the whole thing was, it was a feeble punishment for someone like him. He was the Empire’s war dog, a criminal in an invisible jail cell — so what need did he have for closeness? The parts of him that ached and pined were gone and buried; his capacity for weakness no longer existed by design. And yet, ever since she first approached the Death Knight in the Holy Mausoleum, her body betraying a fury her face could not, he began to wonder what it would be like to live for another. Even if it meant killing them.
The weeks of torment following his awful deed drew to a close one evening in the courtyard by the dining hall. He noted a few eerie similarities to the night of their duel: torchlight licking at her darkened form, her otherworldly eyes sharp with intent, that blasted dagger resting against her hip.
She hailed him in her throaty voice, a scrap of attention he devoured like a starving animal.
“I need to speak with you later. Do you mind?”
He suspected she would, in her discreet manner, ask him to leave the monastery and return to his old post. If not for his desire to be near her, he would have remained on the Western front to begin with. Whether or not he deserved it, living in ignorance of her reappearance would have been a far kinder fate than this.
“Not at all.”
An hour has passed since that brief meeting. He now stands before the doors to her quarters like a man awaiting execution; conflicted yet unafraid. On principle, judgment infuriates him, for justice is fickle and those obedient to its whims are fools. War dog or not, he has no loyalty to anything but his pleasure as it is the only way he knows to live. In this case, however, he believes her punishment just, whatever it may be.
He gives his head a furious shake, breathing quicker than normal. He isn’t calm enough to face her right now but, he reminds himself, every interaction with her risks arousing the Death Knight.
"You look terrible, Jeritza."
Looking down at her again, he swears the anger he felt moments before is purified by her haunting gaze. She is unarmed and devoid of aggression, yet his instincts run wild.
“Come in.”
Byleth closes the door behind him, and locks it. Strange. First, he notices the room is dark. It seems she is about to turn in for the night. Second, she distances herself from him and fidgets with her hands. This is unlike her and far from the behavior of a general preparing to dismiss another.
Her voice is timid. “What happened then—"
What happened then? he thinks. His cock jabbing into the small of her back? Jeritza smirks.
"Was it a mistake?"
At this, he dips into thought; it may just be some lingering, foolish desire for forgiveness, but he still feels he must be careful with his words. While he had once withheld information and guarded certain facts on orders, he is not dishonest or disingenuous, so he answers as such. “My actions were deliberate. I apologize for any discomfort or offense.”
She lowers her chin, breaking their unsteady eye contact. The candlestick on her desk flickers, warming and softening her features. He notices different things about her now — a pink flush to her cheeks that matches her full lips, her silken hair feathering against her jawline — abstract attractiveness most anyone could wear. But it is her, and he finds these inconsequential details sweetly charming.
To have disgraced such a being...
Perhaps it would be wiser to suggest reassignment himself. Her commitment to the emperor's war is far greater than his own, and her performance and reputation carry more weight than his mere obedience. Still, it is a shame.
“Do you want me?”
"Do I…? What?"
"Do you want me?"
“Want” is an inadequate descriptor, though he had never considered her allure anything more than a call for violence and exquisite death. He is preparing himself to leave, yet his odd emotions persist. Never seeing her again, knowing she is alive and out of reach, unable to engage him in combat — it is the unpoetic end to them he has always dreaded, and it threatens to grind his heart into pulp.
“I...do not understand how I feel. But it would seem so.”
Her hands are soft on his cheeks, her lips softer against his. The captivating scent of her, her crushing closeness, draws a strange noise from him. He is only half-aware of himself, overwhelmed by foolish thoughts of secret glances and rosewater.
Byleth releases him from her kiss to lick at his parted lips. Her touch weakens him, he is pliant to her will, boneless when their tongues meet. The points of his shoulder blades bump against the twin doors behind him — hard, winter-chilled oak — as she presses against him with a hunger he has never conceived of her.
Jeritza idles in his mind, baffled by unnamable feelings, but her aggression cannot go unmet. The Death Knight will not allow it.
He winds her hair around his palm and yanks her head back, exposing her throat. The place he cut before is a delicate pink line now, a ghost of the wound’s perfect, sensual weep. So close. He hunches over her and drags the flat of his tongue up her neck, bites into her flushed skin. So, so close to ripping into her — but this is the first time he hears her moan, so lavish it could sustain him for days.
He wants it again.
More.
He bites harder, his cock throbbing at the sound of her voice.
It was pure intuition before, letting her actions and tells speak for their attraction, but now he knows what pain does for her, and what her pain does to him. This, he thinks, must be how pining lovers feel when they confess.
He flips them with ease, pins her between the door and his body. Byleth grapples with the buckles holding his armor in place and tears so desperately at his clothes that he must assist her. Their mouths slip together, interrupted by layers of clothing and distracting planes of bare skin. Her hands skim over his chest, chased by her tongue and teeth. Many would flinch at the sight of his battle-worn body or insult him with sympathy, but she is rough and vicious, greedy — she wants all of him while he is too damn tall to touch her in kind. He cannot stand her kissing and biting and whatever she is doing with that wicked tongue of hers. Jeritza tilts her chin up with a sharp inhale. Byleth is grinning, pink-cheeked and glossy with sweat. The room had been frigid moments ago, now her breasts stick to his ribs, his lips to her panting mouth. This unhindered touch has him hoping, pleading that they will never part again. May she remain as insatiable for the rest of his days. May they take of each other until naught remains.
She caresses the front of his pants and his hips jerk forward to meet her. The feeling is unfamiliar, nothing like when he beats and fondles himself. She is gentle at first, groping him through fabric, then tightens her grip, claws at where he is most vulnerable until he bites back a groan.
How much blood? How much anguish? How many raw, heaving breaths had it taken to come this close to release?
"I couldn’t stop thinking about how you felt against me. I thought I might die," she whispers. It excites him further, hearing her voice so low and yet so promising. "Are you sure—"
"Yes. Now."
“You’re impatient when you want something, aren’t you?”
“I am. Come here.”
Standing limits their connection. He wants access to her plush thighs and the tender places inside of her, wants her to find where he likes to be touched, let her rob him of all thought and reason — things they could never do with blades. Not this time, anyway.
She leads him to her neglected but tidy bed. She is demure, peeking over her shoulder while she mounts his lap. He can’t look at her that way; it is far too intimate, threatening to rekindle his mess of confusing emotions. He focuses instead on locks of her hair lazing across her tight-muscled shoulders, follows the dip of her spine to her bottom.
Her leather waistband is like glass beneath his gloves. “Off.”
Byleth leans back into him for a moment, bridging her hips and working her shorts down in silence. He only just realizes her pleasant weight when she is straddling him again, hovering over his bound arousal in nothing but the abstract shadow of her tights.
She dressed without smallclothes before asking him to her quarters.
Jeritza has little interest in physical charms, but this shameless view of her makes his blood seethe. He is curious about her body, craving her skin and her voice — the Death Knight is almost howling for it. Pristine flesh between ridges of scar tissue, contusive dents in her muscles, sensitive bruises left by lucky foes.
He touches the tips of her breasts and she rewards him with an appreciative whine. It comes again, louder when he pinches and twists. He regrets having her back to him, unable to watch her sweet, pitiful face while he plays with her. Another time, he thinks, tracing the shuddering angle of her hips down to the seam of her tights; so slick and humid. Much, much better than a crude dab of saliva on his palm.
“Yes,” she sighs. “There.”
He prods at her center, tests the give. “Here?”
She guides his hand to her mouth and takes the fingertips of his glove between her teeth. She yanks it off, spits it out with a mercenary’s elegance. “Inside.”
There is a hole in her tights near the seam, wide enough for him to fit his two middle fingers. He pets the unfamiliar parts between her legs, absorbed in curiosity. Minutes ago, he expected her to banish him to the other side of the country, now it seems she would die before doing so.
“Please..."
He slides in up to his knuckles. Every part of her is drawn to his touch, her entire body wanting for penetration. She is nuzzling against his jaw, her small hands disarranging his already unkempt hair. He cannot help a mean-spirited chuckle.
“You are absolutely pitiful.”
“Aah!”
She begins to squirm. It won't do to have her thrashing around — this is so new and wonderful to him. He stills and silences her with a bite on her ear. When he is certain she has understood him, he hooks his fingers and dips further inward, fucking her with a solid rhythm.
The pathetic whimpering muffled behind her closed lips is addictive. He fixates on it, on having power over her, more than he has ever tasted, while she trembles against him. Obedient for him. So well-behaved.
He withdraws his fingers.
Byleth turns her head and moves her lips against his neck. "Fuck me... Please…"
“Obscene,” he murmurs, chiding the both of them.
“Only for you."
Devotion, desire, obedience, suffering — such things twist his guts and make him ache and she knows it. She knows how to dig into him. His perfect opponent.
It takes little strength to tear the webbing of her tights. He doesn’t destroy them, however. He quite likes them. And judging by her yelp of dismay, so does she. That disappointment fades as soon as he shoves his pants down to his thighs. Byleth breathes a distracted “oh” and he blanches, struck by the dumb realization that she is the first to see and touch him like this. She wraps her fingers around him, fondling and teasing with shameless glee. In any other situation, he would not hesitate to run her through for such nonsense, but this is endearing — flattering, even.
She holds him at the base and lines him up, allowing him to frot against her a few times before he fills her in one push. Their bodies collide with a muted slap, and she cries out as if he has torn her open.
For a moment, Jeritza worries, anxious to make sure she is unhurt, but the Death Knight is more intuitive to her pain. The beast who longs to kill her most understands her better than a man still afflicted by humanity. When he takes hold of her neck, he knows she feels leather and the sting of cold metal.
Her hand covers his as he squeezes her throat.
They are a monstrous thing together. He yearns to watch them, take them in like a greedy voyeur while they torment each other with the promise of release. She has brought his free hand, still slick, to the crux of her thighs again, lets him rub her clit in languid circles while she claws at his forearm. He growls as she rakes him open; she gasps for air.
It seems unnatural to fuck her so deep at such a dissonant pace — slow and heavy, quick and shallow — yet she accepts every inch of him, reassuring him with throaty moans and the occasional word of praise. She tells him he is wonderful, that she is his plaything, she wants him, she wants him. It confuses him at first, but her voice is intoxicating and he will do anything to hear more.
“Please… I need...harder…”
Yes, anything .
A desperate sob strains against her sealed lips while he thrusts sharp into her. He half-notices the jolt of her breasts. Though he appreciates these oft unseen parts, he cares more for her throat cartilage bowing against his palm, her frantic pulse. Others covet the outside of her body while he wants to know her inside — her blood, her tissue, her bones — everything that moves her to fit him so well. To know her is to please her is to kill her.
It surprises him to hear someone so collected and mild climax as loud as she does. Her back tightens and arches as it did when they dueled but now she tips backward, writhing against him. His cock slips out of her, but it doesn’t matter — her near-dead gaze, glassy and sapped of light, is enough to drag him down with her. And in this moment, when he is at his weakest, the clever woman reaches between their legs and cups his tightened balls, presses between them, lovingly, as if he hadn’t bitten and strangled her. Pleasure strikes him hard in the chest; he feels it in his skull; he hides his face in the curve of her neck to muffle his husky cry, but not without glimpsing her look of cruel delight.
There is no rest for him, no mercy, as she takes him in hand and defiles her sweat-slick body with every last drop of his release that remains.
When the time comes, he is certain they will kill each other this way. A mutual execution, a dizzy afterglow as their minds go dark.
Byleth finds his hair with her red-stained fingertips and tugs, prompting him to face her again. Her gentle kiss is a trite resolution to their coupling, but he likes it. He licks her mouth open, tastes her again, and she returns his affections with a delicate smile. Those pretty things about her still please him, even when they are settled, lying prone and exhausted on rumpled sheets.
He stares at the ceiling, stroking her hair while his pulse slows and allows himself a smile like hers. For once the Death Knight will not torment his sleep with demands, and he will not detest himself in the morning for the pleasures he had taken the night before.
He offers to repair the knitting on her tights; her arms tighten around his neck.